Each vocation is a story of friendship with
our Lord. I was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba,
Canada. I am grateful to have been born in a
family that sought from the start to transmit this friendship
with Christ. I have fond memories of my first catechism
classes and my preparation for First Communion and Confirmation. We
often prayed the Rosary together as a family, and I
am sure the Blessed Mother helped me to grow in
my faith and to open the eyes of my heart
to the needs of those around me. At bedtime my
mother would read us the lives of the saints or
some stories from the Old Testament from a picture Bible
followed by a prayer. Thanks to these simple childhood experiences,
God became for me somebody true, present, real and good
in my life. I also experienced how a family that
prays together stays together, despite the difficulties that family life
sometimes entails.

I was a fairly
active boy. I loved sports, including swimming, baseball, soccer, street
hockey, and biking. I was a member of the Boy
Scouts for 3 years and a member of the Navy
Cadets for 4 years. I was also an altar boy
in the parish until I was 18. I had a
great time, made some good friends, and grew as well
in personal discipline, sense of team work, and leadership. In
high school I also joined the debating team and did
some theatre presentations in my school. Despite all the activities,
I also made a point to take my studies seriously.

My interest in
the priesthood began when I was 7 or 8 years
old. I remember telling my mom one night before going
to bed that if God wanted something from me in
life it was to become a priest. Everything seemed to
make my vocation an easy choice.

All that came
to an abrupt end during my teenage years. I really
wanted to get married and have a family. I loved
rock music and cruising around town with my friends in
a beat up old Chevy Chevette. I wanted to make
some money to buy my way to a comfortable life.
If anybody dared talk to me about the vocation to
the priesthood I would explode. I had hardened my heart,
but God was patient and found a gentle way of
helping me to grow in my generosity with him.

When I was
15, Fr. Rheal Forest, a cousin of mine from the
Archdiocese of Saint-Boniface (my archdiocese) invited me to accompany him
once a month to a medium-security jail where he worked
as a chaplain. After having seen so many movies, I
was looking forward to the adventure of exploring life in
the penitentiary. In reality, it was more ordinary than I
thought. Fr. Rheal would celebrate Mass for the prisoners, and

Fr. Richard with his parents on the day of his ordination to the diaconate, June 30, 2009.

I would serve. Afterwards he would hear confessions, and I
would share a snack with the prisoners that had gathered
in the chapel. They were men who had suffered a
lot in life. Some of them shared with me their
stories. What surprised me the most was to see the
tremendous difference the presence of a priest had made in
their lives. Most of them were undergoing a conversion. Many
of them had grown so much in their faith that
they feared being released, because they did not want to
lose their friendship with Christ.

Doing this apostolate
helped me to appreciate the priesthood and the infinite value
of souls. Deep down I wanted to do something good
with my life, something truly worthwhile. Could the priesthood be
for me?

I met the Legionaries of Christ for
the first time in 1990, when two Legionaries visited my
classroom to tell us about their vocation. I was in
a very good parish school, called St. Maurice, directed by
my parish priest, Fr. Patrick Morand, who was also a
tremendous example for me of priesthood lived to the full.
In the years that followed I came to know the
Legion and Regnum Christi better, especially during the retreats they
organized for boys three times a year in my home
town of Winnipeg. My mother became a member of Regnum
Christi and began organizing formation sessions for mothers of young
children with Familia, the Regnum Christi program for families.

I was impressed with the Legionaries’ love for the
Church, and their zeal for souls. Although my vocation was
still a distant hypothesis at that moment, I remember thinking
that if God were to call me to be a
priest, that I wanted to be like them.

In 1993, when I
was 16 years old, Regnum Christi organized an international retreat
for hundreds of youth who making a pilgrimage to Denver
to participate in the World Youth Day with Pope John
Paul II. Fr. Rheal gathered a group of young people
from his parish to participate in both events, and he
invited me to come along. I was blown away by
the experience of celebrating my faith with 300,000 young people
and hearing the Pope’s invitation to live our faith with
conviction and without fear in order to usher in a
new evangelization. I felt the need to grow in my
spiritual life and to do something for Christ and the
Church. At the end of the retreat, I decided to
become a member of Regnum Christi as a means to
respond to the Holy Father’s call.

Two years later came my high school graduation.
I had no idea what to do with my life.
Politics and business, two careers which had fascinated me in
the past, no longer seemed to fit the bill. I
had just broken up with my girlfriend, a girl I
had met at World Youth Day in Denver. What I
needed was time to reflect on the road I wanted
to take. I kept in contact with the Legionaries, and
they invited me to do a year as a full-time
lay volunteer, as an opportunity to intensify my spiritual life
and listen to what God wanted from me, while putting
my talents at the service of the Church.

As it turned out, I spent my year
as a Regnum Christi volunteer working at the Center for
Integral Formation in Cheshire, Connecticut, which publishes materials for Regnum
Christi members. Since it is near the Legionary novitiate, I
had the opportunity to visit on several occasions. I felt
at home among the novices. They were happy to have
given their lives to Christ and the Church, and it
made me think that being a priest was not all
that bad after all. I felt that as a Legionary
I could finally satisfy my desire to do something that
was really worthwhile by saving souls and serving Christ and
the Church. God’s call once again resounded in my heart.

What I had been missing in the past was generosity.
It was the joy, peace and charity of the novitiate
that the Lord gave me the grace of generosity to
answer his call. After a time of retreat, I decided
to enter the novitiate.

I thank God for
having given me a mother and a father and two
younger sisters who welcomed my vocation and gave me their
unconditional support, even though it was not always easy. Thank
you Lord for the gift of my vocation!

Fr.
Richard Tardiff was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, on March
8, 1977. He studied at Saint-Maurice High School. On February
11, 1996, he entered the novitiate of the Legionaries of
Christ in Cheshire, Connecticut, and was a founding member of
the novitiate in Cornwall, Ontario. He did his humanities studies
in Cheshire, Connecticut. He was a youth director in Quebec
and Ontario for two years, and then was a teacher
and business manager at the novitiate in Cornwall. He was
the secretary for the territorial director of France for one
year. He obtained his licentiate in philosophy and his bachelors
in theology at the Pontifical Regina Apostolorum College. He currently
serves as a youth director in the northwest of France.

The vocation stories of the
Legionaries of Christ who were ordained on December 12, 2009
have been published in the book "I Call You
Friends". During this Year for Priests, let us
pray for all priests, so that their self-giving to God
and to people will bear abundant fruits of grace and
blessings.